'Don't he never sleep?'

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Pastoral

There’s this great scene in Soylent Green, where an elderly character (played by Edward G. Robinson, who himself was dying of cancer during filming) goes to a government sponsored euthanasia center to be put down. The orderlies ask him what kind of music he’d like to go out to, and he picks classical.

I wonder what I’d like to listen to if I was going through the process. It’s tough to say, but I’d imagine it’d be pretty weepy and sentimental material. But who knows, maybe I’d want light hearted stuff to send me off.

Last night walking home, I thought,’what if I was hit by a bus, and as I was dying, I could still hear my i-pod (never mind that the ear buds would be knocked out of my ears). As I walked, I noted the songs that randomly shuffled through the ‘all songs’ setting. Here’s what I got:

Amazing. I just watched this movie last night for the umpteenth time. I actually considered blogging about it. I was trying to figure the music out (think maybe it was Vivaldi) but couldn’t find it in the credits.

Soylent Green is grossly underrated. It has its 70’s cheese moments, and it’s sort of a pot boiler at times, but the overall sense of dread is haunting and the performances are great. Any of the scenes featuring Heston and EGR are a treat, too.